‹
VENTUREBEAT
›

Truedomain is announcing a cloud-based service today aimed at stopping email scams before users fall for them. It is also announcing it has raised $1.2 million in seed funding.

The Truedomain anti-phishing network addresses phishing attacks, which try to get users to click on bad links in emails that will take them to fake sites to scam them out of their credit card numbers and other personal identification.

The goal is to bring trust back to email. A study by security firm VeriSign found that 88 percent of consumers can’t distinguish between a legitimate web site and its phishing clone. Menlo Park, Calif.-based Truedomain believes that the same is true with email bait.

Truedomain has tested its technology in a beta test with FastMail, provider of fast email service. And now it is working with other email providers and online brands to protect about 300 million consumer email accounts from phishing, though it doesn’t have permission to reveal its customers yet. The company is unveiling the service today at the Launch: Silicon Valley 2010 event.

Truedomain’s anti-phishing network combines authentication technology with a user feedback loop and analytics system that together can stop fraudulent emails. Just as VeriSign has done this for web browsers, Truedomain wants to clean up emails by not only being reactive, but preventive as well, said Robert Pickup, chief executive of Truedomain.

Phishing attacks are costing consumers and businesses about $3 billion in losses per year, according to market researcher Gartner Group. While big banks and their customers were the initial targets, now smaller enterprises and their employees are being attacked.

Truedomain was founded in 2009 and it has five employees and three contractors. Rivals include startups such as eCert and Authentication Metrics as well as big security vendors such as Symantec, McAfee and Cloudmark. Truedomain tries to set itself apart by using the same preventive measures across its different email clients.